Todays Buzz

I went to the zoo today.. to see fruit bats. Yep apparently.  I also went to see the Lions.  I did not see any.. any.  Are they still there? and I remember the penguins as having 20-30  this time I saw 6.  What is the deal?  I felt ripped off.  Tons of parrots.  Why?  apparently every pet owner drops off their parrot when they cannot handle them.  They get lonely and neurotic and start eating your house.

No caching today. Though I did prepare for a 190 cache series to be listed.  I just need to reach the time and hit the magic button.

I did list a few today, but they were ones that I was working through with other cachers. 

Sadly I finished archiving about 1oo caches.  About 75% were because the caches were to close to others.  Another 20% were because they just needed to tell me where they lived, so I could make sure they could maintain them, or give me some maintenance info because they lived a ways away. and the last 5% were a mix of small issues.  In National Parks, Wilderness, etc and never got around to moving them.

So live goes on. Tomorrow I should have a small group ready to go. Yes.  the fun will begin in earnest. and a caching trip with friends.  Lets enjoy the day, a holiday even.

NEEDS ARCHIVED!!

I recently was asked by someone why one cache was archived quickly and another is archived weeks later after someone placed a needs archived note on them. I thought I would take a moment to shed some light on my thought.

I should say that I save every needs archived email that I get.  I narrow that into four categories.

1. Are you kidding?  This category is for odd or dumb things.  Cache appears to be cracked, you saw a snake near it.  The cache is still there, and perhaps deserves a needs maintenance.  I usually ignore these altogether.
2. hmmmm maybe.  You report the cache as missing. Perhaps you are the first one. Or it is a high difficulty.  With these I place in a folder to look back on them in the future.  Seeing if there are more needs archived notes, or if the owner responded. 
3. Looks missing.  In this case we have an active owner or a number of DNF's. Perhaps the NA note was placed some time ago, and the owner has not responded.  These usually mean I will place a note for the cache owner to take a look at the cache or it will be archived.
4. Gone.  This category is for those that people have checked back on, is not there, and the owner is not active.  Poof.  the cache will go away.

All of these can be adjusted by certain factors.  Difficulty, number of DNF's, did experienced people visit or new cachers, has someone visited that found the cache before, type of cache, is the owner honest (yes some lie to us - shocking), etc.  All of these can adjust things.

Note:  if a cache is archived it can be revived.  I bring back a few each month that a cache owner has went out and fixed.  It is subject to a re review, so  it has to meet the current requirements.  (that is why virtuals, webcams cannot be unarchived). 

Hope that helps? any questions feel free to ask. (no specifics please)

Piles of caches - and What to watch for.

Wow.. today was one of those days.  Once and a while I get a ton of caches to review. Usually it consists of 5-10 people putting out 1-3 caches each.. and maybe one with 6-7.  So a heavy day is made up of 35-40 to go over.. and about 30-35 will get listed.

New people seem to have the most trouble.  That is expected.  Usually it is missing home coordinates or too close to other caches.  Less often are caches that I catch that have a business in the name.  They pop up because people think it is cute to use a nearby business, if it is a bigger company I usually catch it.

Today was one of those days.  It seemed there were 20-30 people or more listing many caches.  In the end I think I counted 52 caches that were listed with a lot that were waiting to have a few fixes by the cache owner.  That is a lot. More than I normally do.  Outside of times people were putting out a power trail this appears to be the biggest day.

So how can you get you caches listed?

The process is pretty simple.

1. Proximity.  Make sure there are no other caches around you.  Load them in your gps.  Then when you get back home do a search for the coordinates.  If you are not a premium member when you do a search it will pop up. it will not tell you its coordinates, but it will tell you SW 522 feet. Remember 528' is the rule.  There is no longer a "across the river/freeway" exception. There are some that are given, about 1-2 a month.  Usually for something dramatic, or they are a few feet to close to a puzzle, or be new. 
2. Avoid homes.  If you are publishing in a residential area, expect questions.  GPS units can be 50-70 feet off.  Are there clear hints? Is it your home? Are the neighbors aware (remember 50 feet off can be on their porch).  Do you mention you have their permission.
3. Colleges.  Every college student wants to place a cool ammo can labeled "grenades" on campus.  Welcome campus police and bomb squad.  They should know, use a clear container, or make it a micro, oh and label it.
4. Commercial.  Pizza Hut cache, or Zion's Bank Cache will not get listed without permission from groundspeak.  If you place those in your cache page you will get a similar result.  You will get tied up waiting for permission.
5. Challege caches.  Did you complete it? or is a number of people able to.  Prove it. Put the info in your description.  Oh by the way, it cannot be a list of Bobs, or your own caches.  Unless Bob has 300 and you want people to find a small number (but not your own).
6. No travel bug Prisons.  Travel bugs are not yours, THEY ARE NOT TRADE ITEMS.  Did I say THEY ARE NOT TRADE ITEMS.  You cannot say take one, leave one.  You can ask, but not tell them.  Personally if I run accross a prison, it is time for a Jail break.  If you are carrying 20 of them around, please set them free.  That is the goal, not for Bob to carry them.

That is pretty much the major things I run across.  Hopefully these help. Oh by the way there is one thing that you should remember.  Patience.  If I have a question or a problem I move on.  Why have a load of caches waiting because someone wants to hide a camo taped pvc pipe in a the bushes by the courthouse 300' from another?  I will spend time writing it up, so I move on. 

I may have some concerns and I email another reviewer for their opinion, or put it on the reviewer forum for all of them to give their ideas.  I also may not review for a day.. or two. I do have a life and go caching, or get out of town.  So a delay may be for a few issues.

Emailing every 120 minutes will not help.  If there was some issue, please post notes on the cache page.  If in a few days no response is coming along email me.  Give me the GC code so I can find it.  I have over 350 caches on hold right now (some waiting to be published others for issues).  Yes I do need to clear them out.

Importing the past, and the future

I am slowly closing down my old website on Google.  I transferred over all my old files today.  So instead of a 6 week old blog.. we jump back to  a year.

So one year of random thoughts.  Most of my earlier stuff was related to when I was just a reviewer.  I realized that there was not a lot to say.  Cool stuff, I can't say.  Some things I have to just wait until more is released. 

So I started to talk less and less.  Most of the old trending topics were maintenance, and reviewing.  Much has changed.

Thanks everyone for letting me have fun with you for the last year.  If I have upset you, I am sorry. Some have been vocal and hostile with me about groundspeak policies, or how I try to accoplish them. Hopefully the venting has helped out.  I have learned a ton, many things the hard way.  Like when I had to constantly move a cache because I doing things wrong at first, this is much the same.

If you have concerns let me know.  If you want to chat... the same.  I am pretty busy and it may be put off for a bit, but I save them all.  I save every needs archived email, until it is back or resolved. So if I take a bit, there may be some reasoning.

Once again thanks.  Utah cachers are the best.

Scout Caches and Reviewing

I went with my family camping this last weekend to Maple Dell Scout camp.  I was there for July 4-7, enjoying the mountains and relaxing for a few days.  It was a good time except for one small detail, two small details actually.

I was trying to review caches.  Quite often it is a bit of work.  Checking for all the possible issues and looking for problems, and most of the time publishing them.  This was a holiday weekend, and cachers were out around the state placing caches wherever they could find them.  So I ended up looking at all the caches that were available on my little cell phone screen.  It was harder than I expected.  I have done 2-3.. or even a dozen.  But trying to go through 15-20 each day was a bit tricky.  I cannot really leave a note for people if there was a problem, so I just tried to list the ones that I could.  Sorry for those that waited until Wednesday for an answer.

I am shocked at the amount of caches that people are asking to be listed.  So many new players are appearing.  There are a lot of new people out to place caches, and so many are being listed.  If you are from the Vernal Area you are seeing a huge group of new listings appear.  Great series and trails are being worked on, and many creative and interesting caches are being listed. 

I headed up to do the scout caches around the camp.  I still have a number more to go.  You can see above that I have done a number but I still have a few others.  I normally avoid puzzle caches. (You can guess why).  These are relitivly easy puzzles so I have taken the time to get them done. 

Hopefully I will get up soon and do some more of them.  This has been my most enjoyable series so far.  I hiked about 3 miles this vacation to get a group of them. (about 10 I think).